WRB: The logic behind the seemingly illogical demands

The Women's Reservation Bill and the controversy surrounding it have invited many comments and counter-proposals. Some observers, for instance, have supported the proposal for amending the R.P.Act to force the political parties to nominate a certain number of women candidates in the elections, failing which they would lose their recognition. Critics of this proposal are concerned that this may not guarantee 33% seats in Parliament and state assemblies for women. The proponents of 'Let the parties reserve tickets for women' suggest that we could, while amending the R.P.Act for the purpose, require the parties not to field candidates from the same constituencies from which they were fielded last time, in order to not restrict women candidates to losing seats. They also suggest that the parties may be required to ensure that 38 per cent of their candidates are women, so that at least 33 per cent get elected. Interesting as these proposals are, they miss the logic behind the demand for 33%.

Proponents of 33% quota for women defend their demand on the ground that women have been deprived of sufficient representation for several decades, and therefore, the demand for 33% seats for women, is justified. The alternative proposals ask them to hope and experiment, instead of looking for guarantees, whereas the proponents of 33% see merit only in guaranteed representation. Alternative proposal-makers don't understand the obsession with 33 per cent. They may well be correct. But so have been many events in our history. Why did the British and the Indian nationalists choose August 15, 1947 as the Independence Day? Indeed, there is an interpretation that had we accepted Independence in 1948, we could have avoided the Partition riots. Take another instance. Our Constitution guarantees many rights, which could well have been left to chance and circumstances. But based on historical experience, our Constitution-makers and subsequently the Judiciary which expanded these rights, believed they were basic rights, and could not be left to the mercies of the state and non-State actors. Or take the question of 22% quota for SC/STs in education, jobs and representative bodies, fixed at the time of founding the Republic. The figure could well have been attacked as an irrational obsession. But we needed to arrive at some figure, based on the collective understanding of the extent of discrimination they suffered historically, and the nature of compensatory regime required to uplift them. Again, this could not have been left to chance, or hope that parties would field more SC/ST candidates out of benevolence.

The understanding of the proponents of undiluted 33% quota is also flawed. They assail the demand for sub-quota within 33% because they suggest that the compulsions of competitive politics will do justice to those who demand sub-quota. They may well be correct in their understanding of the political reality. But the proponents of sub-quota also demand guarantees, like the proponents of 33%. Well, an aspiration for guarantee can be denied on the ground that it could expressly violate the provisions of the Constitution. The answer is to reach a consensus on the required amendments, rather than fail to notice the force behind the rising aspirations among the hitherto excluded sections for representation through guaranteed quota.

In the aftermath of historic passage of WRB in RS

*My detailed story on the recent Delhi High Court judgment granting the right of women to Permanent Commission in the Army and the Air Force. I was surprised to find that the UPA Government which is claiming credit for the WRB, in fact, seriously contested the right of women for PC in Army and Air Force. An instance of double-standards?

*Frontline's cover story on WRB: Contributors, who are on the whole optimistic that more women MPs would mean more women-friendly policy-changes, examine various aspects of the Bill, and dispel misgivings. Sabiha Hussain is on the need to have sub-quota for Muslim women. Her concern that in the absence of sub-quota, parties will not nominate enough Muslim women candidates appears to be based on reality. It is reasonable to suggest that OBC women may entertain similar misgivings about their poor representation in the absence of sub-quota. Brinda Karat is sympathetic to this demand, but feels it should not stop the passage of the Bill in the Lok Sabha and is optimistic that OBC and Muslim women will get due representation without separate sub-quota, once the Bill is enacted.

* Apart from patriarchal opposition to the Bill from the Yadav trio, there is a non-patriarchal opposition to the Bill, which believes that the representation of OBC and Muslim women will suffer once the Bill becomes the Act. Those who suggest that it will not suffer cite history of representation of OBC men which has been raising; those who apprehend exclusion of OBC and Muslim women once the Bill becomes the Act without the sub-quota have so far only certain misgivings which remain to be substantiated. The optimism of the former may indeed be based on considerations of reality, but it still needs to be tested out. In my tentative view, the data regarding representation of OBC and Muslim women in local bodies is mixed, and may not be the correct indicator of what is likely to happen in the legislative bodies under the new law. We need to consider other factors like parties' willingness to field more Muslim and OBC women after the law is enacted. This means experimenting with the new law for a few years, and analysing the results for course-correction in the years ahead. The other alternative is to work out a suitable sub-quota through political consensus which will be a challenge under the current circumstances.

Rajya Sabha debate on WRB

Apart from the controversial issue of sub-quota, the WRB is also discussed animatedly for its other features. One is the phenomenon of rotation of seats. Many analysts are concerned that this aspect is likely to sound the death knell of representative democracy, because the MPs will now have no incentive to nurture a constituency. It is interesting that the Jayanthi Natarajan Committee considered this issue, but rejected it finding no merit in the argument. I too don't find any merit in this argument because if an MP had indeed nurtured a constituency which he or she might not represent after the next election, the voters in his or her new constituency or whenever he or she contests again after an interregnum, will positively consider this aspect, and hope that he or she would similarly nurture the new constituency too. In any case, nurturing a constituency is strictly not a legislator's duty, as he or she is expected to contribute to law-making rather than attend to municipal works in the constituency. How did the MPs in Rajya Sabha debate this issue (or debate this at all?). The readers can find it out themselves.
The debate is now available on Rajya Sabha site here,, here, here, and here.

Politics of WRB: An interview

Well-known journalist Vidya Subrahmaniam of The Hindu wrote a stimulating article yesterday on the politics of WRB. I thank her for responding to some of my questions on her piece here. Her answers fill the gap between the legal and political understanding of this historic legislation.

Q: You are optimistic that the same forces that brought the OBC men in large numbers into Parliament and the Assemblies will, over time, inevitably tilt the balance of woman power towards the more socially disadvantaged. Can you identify and be specific and perhaps elaborate about these forces? Can you also explain how they succeeded?

VS: The forces that brought OBC men into legislatures are the forces unleashed by Mandal. Mandal stirred up the electorate, brought in new awareness about subaltern identity, and gave a fillip to the social justice parties. As they started fielding more OBC candidates, others had to follow suit. The BJP for instance coopted OBCs, calling it social engineering. I have cited the figures in the U.P Assembly in the story. My case is that in a predominantly rural OBC constituency, you cant import a urban upper crust woman. Surely, it cannot be the case of the SP and the RJD that they will field upper caste, urban elite women in these constituencies?

Q:Both the Geetha Mukherjee committee report in 1996 and now the Jayanthi Natarajan report in 2009 support the need for quota within quota, and want the Government to examine it at the appropriate time. Therefore, the reluctance of the political class comprising the Congress, BJP and the Left to consider the pre-enactment stage as the appropriate time, to fill that gap is inexplicable to me.

VS: I am not opposed to sub-quota on principle but I'm convinced that it is a ploy to scuttle the bill. For instance, Mulayam says he wants sub -reservation within the women's quota not just for OBCs, but also for Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Parsis etc. There are constitutional difficulties in enacting such a bill. There is no quota for Muslims or other religions in the general category, courts have repeatedly struck down religion-based reservation. The only way to do it is to bring them into the OBC quota, which will again be opposed by the Yadavs. They do not want the bill. Period. And they will do anything and everything to stop it.

Q: You suggest that the parties can individually take the initiative to nominate more women candidates from the OBCs and other underprivileged sections. The same argument can also be advanced to suggest why we require this bill at all. If the Bill's objective is to ensure greater representation of women, then the parties, on their own could have ensured that they field enough women from winnable seats. Since it doesn't happen, the WRB is considered necessary. The logic of competitive populism could have been expected to play a role here also. But it is obvious that the logic is impractical, because there is no level-playing field, where all the parties are equally convinced about the merits of fielding more women candidates. The question of who will bell the cat first will remain to be answered because the party which takes such initiative, so as to set the ball of competitive populism logic rolling, will have to accept certain risks, including inability to capture power after the elections. Had the UPA done so at the 2009 elections, it could have very well faced that risk.

VS: There is substantial evidence to show that women candidates have a better winning rate than men. This is so across parties, and holds true even for SP, BSP and the like. But fielding more women will cut into male seats, hence the resistance. Sonia and Sushma ought to have over-ridden objections but the fact that powerful as they are even they have not been able to do it shows how patriarchal our system is. If the bill becomes law, then they will all have to field women compulsorily. The question is: Can they afford to give ticket to just one kind of women? I am saying they cannot. But politics is also about symbolism. Which is why it is important for Congress and BJP to say that they will proactively allot ticket to OBC, Muslim women etc. It is simply not enough to say that it will happen automatically. If you want to seize the initiative from your opponents, you have to beat them at their own game.

Q: While exposing the parties' double-speak on the WRB, you have not explained WHY the parties are reluctant to voluntarily field more women candidates, if the logic of competitive populism is so compelling. Is it due to the parties' ignorance or some other reason?

VS:Mainstream parties do not allot ticket to women in greater numbers because parties are patriarchal, and women cannot be accommodated without displacing men, which is asking for trouble as you can see from the opposition to the bill. OBC parties are being duplicitous because they do not want the bill, and they are simply couching their gender bias in demands for OBC-minority reservation.

Q:The logic of competitive populism will also apply to SC/ST reservations in general. In principle, therefore, you end up questioning the relevance of these quotas as well, because the parties are smart enough not to ignore the social composition of our electorate, and their razor-sharp understanding of politics would have led to fielding enough SC/ST candidates as well. The underlying logic, therefore, is that castes and groups don't vote en bloc to the candidates hailing from similar castes or groups. This is what successive elections have revealed. Instead, they judge candidates' merits on various grounds which include caste considerations. It is not clear why competitive populism and parties' understanding of caste dynamics, besides the need to harness diverse social and caste interests to ensure electoral victory should be ingredients of successful strategy in the case of OBCs, but not so in the case of SCs and STs.

VS: I am sure you know that the SC/ST case is entirely different from the rest. The Constitutional special provisions in their case is not a new thing. The framers of the Constitution believed them to be historically oppressed. The institutional prejudices against them still exist, and no government will dare undo reservation for them -- even if their numerical strength and their political importance render it imperative for parties to field them.

Q: Your data on the number of OBC legislators in U.P.stop with 1993. There is a need to compare data especially after the onset of sarvajan politics. Unlike the South, in the North both the OBC and the forward castes are more or less evenly placed. The more than satisfactory representation of OBC male legislators is perhaps due to the higher male literacy rate, which has enabled their better political participation. The question is when we have similar quota for OBCs in local bodies, why deny the same in higher representative bodies. To ask for reservation for OBCs for general seats, before the WRB is a reality, may be misplaced because OBC males are already better represented. On the basis of poor representation of women in general, the apprehension that OBC women may not get representation sufficiently under the WRB appears to be valid.

VS: Why don't OBC men want reservation for themselves? Because their numbers will come down if they are bound within a quota. Why do they insist that the same logic will not apply to OBC women? Not all OBC men are highly literate. If that were the case, then they should accept the creamy layer logic and agree to the exclusion of literate OBC men from OBC job quota. The truth is they want to have their cake and eat it too. Besides, as I have gone to great lengths to explain, the Yadav parties want reservation for OBCs and minorities. The bill will surely get stuck if the latter demand is to be met, and indeed that is the idea behind making such a demand.

Update: Today's (March 18) Indian Express carries an article, based on empirical findings, to suggest that absence of quota for OBC women and Muslims did not result in their underrepresentation in the local bodies. An opposite view is canvassed by this EPW edit, which of course, does not cite any evidence to buttress it.

WRB: Is states' assent mandatory?

There is a widespread view that the amendment of the Constitution enabling reservations for women in state assemblies and Lok Sabha will require ratification by state assemblies under Article 368 of the Constitution. At the PRS blog, Anirudh, however, challenges this view in this post.

Women's Reservations

The Women's Reservation Bill has, justly, invited much interest and celebration. The passionate supporters and opponents are legion, but I've struggled hard to find a nuanced perspective on the entire matter, until I read Pratap B Mehta's op-ed in the Express (here).

I think the op-ed is spot on, and captures what may distress people - who strongly support women's rights and empowerment - about the Bill. I liked this para in particular:

"The third issue is a normative one. We know that in terms of how power operates in society the idea that we are free and equal as individuals is a fiction. All kinds of hierarchies of gender, caste and class characterise the operations of power, and in a healthy polity these need to be redressed. Affirmative action is often necessary in this context. But Indian politics has been dangerously close to enshrining other normative propositions that are dangerous for democracy. The first is the equation of identity with reason, where the assumption is policies track the identities of those who promulgate them. This is often true as a matter of fact, but legitimating it into an organising principle is detrimental to the idea of public reason. It needs to be asked whether it befits a free society to restrict the choice of candidates available to particular constituencies based on particular identity. While it could be argued that de facto this choice is restricted for a whole host of reasons anyway, there is still a great deal of difference between a de facto reality and a dejure acceptance of a principle that it should be restricted."